


Not Power, But Heart

by orphan_account



Category: Persona 5, Persona Series
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Dark, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Past Rape/Non-con, Shadows (Persona Series), Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-18
Updated: 2020-02-18
Packaged: 2021-02-27 20:21:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22791634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: When the Phantom Thieves confront Mishima's shadow, they realize that the moon confidant is more of a danger to himself than anyone else.𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗳𝗶𝗰 𝘄𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝗠𝗶𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗺𝗮 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝗳𝗿𝗼𝗻𝘁𝘀 𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝘀𝗵𝗮𝗱𝗼𝘄 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗔𝗸𝗶𝗿𝗮 𝗵𝗲𝗹𝗽𝘀 𝗵𝗶𝗺.
Relationships: Kurusu Akira/Mishima Yuuki, Mishima Yuuki/Persona 5 Protagonist
Comments: 3
Kudos: 120





	Not Power, But Heart

𝗠𝗶𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗺𝗮: 𝗪𝗮𝗻𝘁 𝘁𝗼 𝗺𝗲𝗲𝘁 𝘂𝗽 𝘁𝗼𝗱𝗮𝘆 𝘁𝗼 𝘁𝗮𝗹𝗸 𝗮𝗯𝗼𝘂𝘁 𝗿𝗲𝗾𝘂𝗲𝘀𝘁𝘀?  
𝗔𝗸𝗶𝗿𝗮: 𝗦𝗼𝗿𝗿𝘆, 𝘄𝗲'𝗿𝗲 𝗯𝘂𝘀𝘆 𝘁𝗼𝗱𝗮𝘆.   
𝗔𝗸𝗶𝗿𝗮: 𝗠𝗮𝘆𝗯𝗲 𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗼𝗿𝗿𝗼𝘄?   
𝗠𝗶𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗺𝗮: 𝗦𝘂𝗿𝗲, 𝗻𝗼 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗯𝗹𝗲𝗺. 

Coding was logical.

Mishima could understand the syntax. He understood how to put all the pieces together into something that made sense. It was like making a mini-verse. Create a new project, populate it with variables, beautify it with styles, and make it work with functions. He could make the forum exactly how he wanted it, had complete power over what was on the site and what wasn't. 

In a way, it was the exact opposite of his actual reality. 

Outside, in his physical world, he was a nobody. A nothing. A big, red zero in every way possible. 

He had no illusions about why exactly he'd thrown himself into making the Phan-site as hard as he had. It was an escape. A way to feel like he was actually doing something instead of just being useless to everyone around him. 

He absently rubbed at a faded bruise on his neck and then looked back at the open file with broken code in front of him. It all blurred together, a big mess of red and blue and green in his text editor. He'd been overzealous, pushed himself too hard, and it was breaking him into smaller and smaller pieces. Breaking up even his code into snippets of words and numbers that he couldn't wrap his head around. 

"C'mon," he muttered, rubbing a hand up his face tiredly. The motion made his elbow knock an empty soda bottle off the desk and it hollowly fell onto the ground next to a plastic chip bag and more cans. The entire desk and ground was littered with trash. Empty convenience store bentos, drinks, and plastic wrappers. It was a mess. 

It had kept piling up over the past few weeks and he hadn't been able to drag himself away from his computer long enough to clean it. With a groan, Mishima pushed himself away from the desk and shook out an old plastic bag to put all of the garbage into. 

His back cracked, his old bruises ached, but most of all his head was pounding against his skull like it wanted to bash its way out. He finished cleaning his space and quietly opened his bedroom door. The hallway was dark, but he knew his dad was probably still watching TV in the living room and he didn't want to be seen. Didn't want anybody to see him. 

He snuck out the front door and dropped his trash off in the large container outside of the apartment complex. 

It was a nice night. The air was balmy and a faint, refreshing breeze blew through the high-rise apartments around him. He took in a deep breath and let the fresh air clear his head. The moon was visible that night, even from the center of Tokyo, where pollution usually hid the stars. The sight of it comforted him in a strange way. The moon was always there. 

.+ . ☾ .☆ . * ● ¸ . + ★ ° :. . • ○ . ★ . * .

When his mind wasn't fogged with code and comments and strategy plans, it always went back to one thought:

_I want to disappear._

He'd wanted to vanish from volleyball practice, to unmaterialize under his parents' disappointed stares, to sink into the ground when Akira had found out what he'd done for Kamoshida. Even after Kamoshida's change of heart, the feeling still hadn't faded like he'd expected it to. 

Mishima wanted to melt. 

His feet were moving before he could think about it. He took off in a random direction. It didn't really matter which one, as long as he could slip into the anonymity of night. Maybe that was another reason why he liked the forum so much. He liked pretending to be just some other clueless fan. Liked assuming the role. Liked melding into the crowd like he was one of them with none of them ever being any the wiser. 

Most of all though, he liked that he was different from the rest. Knowing that he knew more than any of them. 

It was a contradiction. 

On one hand he wanted to be unseen, untouchable, removed, safe. 

On the other, he loved being special to the Phantom Thieves, being important, being the all-powerful Admin. 

He turned into a narrow alleyway and found himself in front of a bar with a flickering neon sign. He hesitated, his scuffed shoes half sunk into a shallow puddle, then pushed open the heavy door. 

_||___________||_

| 𝘾𝙧𝙤𝙨𝙨𝙧𝙤𝙖𝙙𝙨 𝘽𝙖𝙧 |  
._______________.

Maybe it was his eye bags, or the way he was pretty sure no other high school student looked half as done with life as him, but the lady behind the bar gave him a drink. The red leather of the seat felt stiff and plush at the same time beneath his pants. He was the only one aside from a couple in the back. 

A sophisticated looking glass was slid across the table to him and he picked it up carefully in his shaky hands. He wasn't used to drinking, had no tolerance, but he'd watched enough detective movies in the past to know that it was cool to just drink it all at once. The alcohol made his throat burn, but he kept it down.

He ordered another one and felt his head go numb-soft. 

After about twenty minutes his head was buried in his arms and he stopped being able to get the room to stop rotating.

Mishima knew that what he was doing was dumb. He wasn't stupid. He knew that he should actually work through everything. Finally acknowledge all the things that had been done to him and move past them. That's what heroes did. What sane, healthy people did. 

Acceptance was the first step, right? 

He could do that. 

Easy.

The first thing that came to mind was the teacher's office. The sterile white walls. The floor. His blood. He thought of the way Kamoshida's knuckles had felt against his skin, how the bottom of the man's shoes had dug into his back. He could remember the man's smirk vividly, like it'd been etched into his brain. The school's bathroom sink was there too. How his blood had looked going down the drain, how his shaking fingers had fumbled with bandaids and bandage tape. 

Doing good. 

Next, he thought of the rest of the volleyball members. Thought of their scared faces when he'd walk up them, tell them that they'd been summoned. Every time he'd felt so guilty. So dirty. Like a messenger of death. Shiho's face was the most detailed because he knew that other than him, she suffered at the hands of the volleyball coach the most. Suffered in different, worse ways. 

Except sometimes even the volleyball girls hadn't been enough. 

Sometimes Kamoshida had been too impatient, too angry and high strung. Sometimes he'd simply shoved Mishima against the desk, pulled down his uniform pants and-

Mishima slammed his drink back and the fire of it washed the thought clean away. A tear fell onto the table and he quickly wiped it with his sleeve and then roughly rubbed at his clouding eyes. 

Everything he did was an escape, wasn't it? He was constantly digging himself a bigger hole, falling into the role of the victim over and over. It had to stop. He had to start helping himself instead of waiting for someone else to do it for him. 

But he couldn't, could he? 

"Not strong enough," he mumbled into his sweater as he felt bile push half-way up his throat. He was going to be sick. He stumbled to his feet and looked around for the restroom. It was hard to keep himself together until he reached the toilets but he managed, collapsing to his knees and vomiting into the basin as soon as he was able. It mostly got into the bowl and he slumped against the porcelain seat, feeling miserable and nauseated all over. 

His phone went off in his pocket and he fumbled with it. It was like his eyes couldn't focus. The power button was a struggle to click and his head kept falling to the side. A message notification lit up his phone. Then another one come in. 

_Akira_. Even through all the haze he had the overwhelming urge to respond. Akira had that effect on him. 

𝗔𝗸𝗶𝗿𝗮: 𝗪𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝘆𝗼𝘂?   
𝗔𝗸𝗶𝗿𝗮: 𝗔𝗿𝗲 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗼𝗸𝗮𝘆?  
𝗔𝗸𝗶𝗿𝗮: 𝗠𝗶𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗺𝗮.  
𝗠𝗶𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗺𝗮: ,.𝗶𝗺𝗶𝗳𝗻𝗲 𝗳𝗶𝗻𝗲  
𝗠𝗶𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗺𝗮: ,𝗺𝗵𝗴 𝗺, .  
𝗔𝗸𝗶𝗿𝗮: 𝗪𝗲'𝗿𝗲 𝗴𝗼𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗼 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗲 𝗴𝗲𝘁 𝘆𝗼𝘂. 

_We're_. Panic rose in Mishima's chest and he vomited again into the toilet, his arms shaking as he clutched the edges. He didn't want Akira to see him like this, didn't want anybody to see him like this. The Phantom Thieves were all he had left and if they thought he was a loser- If they knew how broken he was- 

He forced himself to his legs and felt around until the toilet flushed. Maybe if he'd been more sober he could have opened his VPN, masked his location, but his fingers could hardly touch the home button. It was inevitable that they would find him, that was their job after all, so he figured he should at least look as presentable as possible. 

His legs stumbled to the sinks and he splashed cold water onto his face.

When he looked up he saw his own pale reflection, disoriented with alcohol, ragged with exhaustion. God, he looked so _tired_. He didn't generally like looking at himself. Even at just a glance he saw the purple bruises that peaked out from under the collar of his sweater. Noted the peeling bandaids on his neck and the ugly yellow stain on his cheek. Seeing it laid out like that made him remember. 

Remember the pain. 

Remember how nobody, not even his own parents, had cared. 

He ran his shaking hands back under the faucet and when he looked back up a pair of yellow eyes were staring at him from the glass. The mirror version of him didn't look as tired and his mouth was curved into a small but confident smirk. 

"What're you?" Mishima slurred, too numb to even be startled. 

"I'm you, obviously," the mirror version of him—his shadow—replied, "but I'm the you who could never exist in this world. Couldn't, because you're too _weak_." 

Mishima didn't even try to say anything back, just did his best not to lose any more liquids.

"You're too weak to move on, too weak to even kill yourself. You're stuck, waiting for someone to tell you what to do. Stuck waiting for heroes to step in and save you again. Maybe that's why Kamoshida picked you. He knew you were desperate to be noticed, to be ordered around and used." 

Mishima felt hot shame and guilt run under his skin. It was true, wasn't it? He'd been the obvious choice, the easy target. Anyone else would have maybe struggled, done something about it after, but he'd just taken it. Day after day, week after week. 

"Stop it," he grit out between shallow breaths. Memories flickered through his head. A large hand on the back of his neck, a savage voice too close to his ear, the blood on the toilet paper after, the pain of sitting down on the hard chairs in class. 

His shadow stepped out of the mirror and sat on one of the sink edges, spreading his legs. He looked somehow intimidating, strong, a complete reversal of how Mishima usually acted. 

"You just want to be taken care of. Given a role, a place," the shadow whispered, pulling Mishima close by his hoodie, "anyone will do?"

Mishima shook his head weakly but it didn't matter. He knew what was about to happen because he recognized that look. 

He'd just never thought that his own face was capable of making it. 

The shadow yanked him forward and their mouths clashed awkwardly, painfully. Blood sprang from the inside of his lip and Mishima jerked his head away, only to be dragged in again, "I know what you really want." 

The shadow pushed him easily to the tiled floor and stood above him. 

"Why are you doing this?" Mishima asked, his arms struggling to keep him upright. His body felt so heavy, so off-balance. "I don't want this." 

"Liar. I'm you. You made me. But even I can tell how fucked up we are. I want to be invisible but I want to be famous. I want to die but I also want power. Do you know how confusing that is? You should have seen the Phantom Thieves' faces when they confronted me. They were going to fight me but as soon as I started begging them to kill me they ran off. Shame. Bet it'd feel good to be killed by Akira."

The shadow pressed Mishima's cheek against the front of his pants, "you want his eyes on you so bad. It'd be like fulfilling two desires at once." 

_Dizzy_. 

The bathroom slanted dangerously to the right and the world flickered. Mishima tried to stand up but his legs felt like weights. 

"Stop it," he whispered again and the shadow only grinned. 

"You know saying that has never helped you. Ever. You know how to make this stop."

It was true. Tears rolled down his cheeks and Mishima did what he was used to. He let the fight drain from his muscles and leaned into the shadow in front of him. His nose brushed over the obvious tent in the other's pants and he opened his mouth, ignoring the foul taste on his tongue from the alcohol and...other things. 

"That's a good boy. You like being useful, right? Being praised." 

It hurt that he did.

He needed it. 

Mishima clenched his eyes and waited for what he knew would come next. There was something comforting about knowing. A hand curled into his hair and he let it support his head because it was getting really hard to do it himself. 

Footsteps echoed outside in the hallway and the shadow stiffened, his hand painfully clenching in Mishima's strands. 

The bathroom door slammed open and the footsteps came to a stop suddenly, like they'd met an invisible wall. Mishima couldn't turn to look, the hand in hair still keeping his face stationary, but he was grateful for that. He didn't want to have to face any of the Phantom Thieves' stares. 

"What the-" Ryuji's voice sounded startled and too loud in the tiny bathroom.

"Why is the shadow here? Is that even possible?" Takemi's voice was as confused as her teammate's. 

"Let him go." Akira was the only one who didn't sound surprised. His voice was as even as ever. Resolute, commanding. The sound of him taking a step forward echoed in the small room. It made something hot and fleeting run through Mishima's body.

The feeling was extinguished as he was shoved to the ground and the shadow's body straddled his back, legs pressing up against old bruises on his sides. He groaned weakly, his head throbbing, as his eyes clenched shut in pain. A hand wrapped around his neck tightly. 

"Take another step and I'll crush his—my—wind pipe. You know I'll do it. I _want_ to do it."

"You'll die, idiot!" Ryuji yelled and the shadow chuckled lowly. The fingers on his neck tightened and Mishima's legs kicked out uselessly as he scrabbled at the tiles. . 

"That the _point_ , idiot." 

Silence. 

"That's fucked up," Ryuji muttered, sounding genuinely taken aback, and Mishima couldn't help but silently agree. His desires were obviously warped beyond any of their expectations. Even his own. 

"I want to talk to Akira," the shadow demanded, "alone." 

" _This_ again?" Ryuji growled but Akira must have whispered something because he grudgingly agreed and left the room with Takemi. The bathroom door swung shut behind them loudly and then it was just the three of them. Akira, Mishima, and Mishima's unhinged shadow. 

"Let him go," Akira broke the silence with his heavy words, "and we'll talk." 

The shadow considered for a second before he unwrapped his hand from Mishima's neck slowly. Mishima gasped for air, coughing pitifully against the floor as his throat burned where it'd been squeezed too tight. He tasted blood on his tongue, bitter and sharp. 

"I'm not moving far from him. I'm not an idiot," the shadow smiled, "you guys think I'm dumb, huh? Think you can just use me for publicity and never show any gratitude. It's like you don't _notice,_ but I know you do. I know you can see." 

Akira didn't say anything anything and the shadow chuckled dryly. It was an ugly sound. Cold hands pulled Mishima's sweater up over his back and he gasped as his skin was exposed to the cool air. 

He knew that his back was a mess. It was where most of his abuse had been directed since injuries there were easily hidden. Bruises varying shades of purple, green, and yellow littered the skin from his shoulders to his hips. He knew that there were handprint shaped ones and even bites that had scarred on his skin unevenly. 

"You knew." The shadow pressed on, words like daggers, "and you never asked. Didn't care enough."

"That's not true. I didn't know you wanted to talk about it. Didn't want to hurt you any more." 

The shadow snarled, "don't fucking lie to me, _Joker_. You only ever pretended to care." 

"I didn't."

" **Shut up**. You know how I feel about you and you ignored it. You know how much I want you to notice me. To _see_ me. To pay even the slightest bit of attention to me."

Akira didn't say anything for a tense moment. 

"I do," he said eventually, something hesitant lining his voice. 

"So you were just going to use my feelings to keep me strung along forever?"

"No. It's _because_ I noticed that I didn't say anything. Mishima, you need to focus on yourself. Not on me, not on the site, not on the Phantom Thieves. You need to focus on you. I've been trying to tell you this but it just makes you push yourself even harder like you have to prove yourself." 

Akira took a breath, "you don't have to prove yourself to me. You've already done that."

"How? By being your _number one fan_? By chasing behind you guys like some lost puppy?"

Akira took another step forward, "no. By helping dozens of people escape their abusers. Giving them peace. By doing for them what you can't do for yourself. Yes, you've taken it too far, but that doesn't invalidate the good you've done."

Mishima felt tears collect in his eyes and he knew they were falling before he could even try to stop them. His brain was a mess—submerged with thoughts and alcohol and stuffed with cotton—but he knew that he'd needed to hear those words. 

Had needed Akira to say them. 

His shadow seemed a little taken aback too because for a few seconds he just stared at the curly haired boy, fingers clenching and unclenching in Mishima's sweater. Akira took the opportunity to step forward again until he was standing right in front of the two of them. 

"You-" The shadow opened his mouth but Akira cut him off. 

"You're a great admin. You're a natural at finding people who need help. I think it's admirable how much passion and enthusiasm you have." 

Mishima's face was on fire. His heart was doing somersaults in his chest. 

"You think you can flatter me into forgiving you?" Even his shadow's voice sounded flustered, panicked. 

"No. I'm just saying what I should have told you all along." Akira knelt down and looked Mishima dead in the eyes, "you think you want to be famous, but really I think you just want to be needed. Even if it's just by one person. You need someone to rely on you and for you to rely on them. You just don't know how it feels since you've never had someone like that before." 

Mishima blinked up in a daze as warm fingers curled into his nail bitten ones against the filthy bathroom tiles. 

"I can be that person." 

Mishima held Akira's hand like it was glass. So softly, like he wasn't really sure if he was allowed to touch the other boy back. Akira deserved better. Didn't deserve be in some seedy bar at 3am holding a drunk and mentally unstable super fan's hand. Mishima couldn't think of the right words to articulate himself, the feeling, but luckily his shadow did.

"You want to help this loser? Damn. I mean, I won't say no, but you should really get some standards." 

The leader of the Phantom Thieves didn't look the shadow's way. His eyes just kept piercing Mishima's, even when the Moon confidant looked away in embarrassment. 

"Mishima, the shadow is you but it's not all you are, do you understand? It's just the parts of you that have become twisted along the way. After everything you've been through, it'd be completely understandable if you had an entire palace, a monster of a shadow. Instead, your shadow hasn't even tried to attack me. If anything, the only person it's hurting is...you." 

The warm hand gently tugged Mishima up and the shadow surprisingly slipped off his back like he was weightless, was really just a normal light-caused shadow. 

"You'll get better, I know you will. I'll help you, you don't have to do it alone any more. I should have stepped in sooner. I didn't know. I didn't know how bad it was until we found your shadow and he-" 

Akira's voice faltered and Mishima's brows furrowed. In his drunken state, his brain decided it was a good idea to put his palm softly to the leader's cheek like he wanted to wipe to sad look off the other boy's face. 

"S'not your fault," he murmured and the slight, relieved upturn of Akira's lips made something light and airy burst in Mishima's lungs. Like his chest had been filled with new life. 

"'M so sorry," Mishima continued as he slumped forward into Akira's chest, his bangs splaying across his hero's shoulder. He knew that he was being selfish, that Akira probably had just said that stuff to get him to calm down and _think_ , that all of this would vanish again by morning, that Akira couldn't be _his_ hero no matter how bad he wanted him to be. Right then he didn't care. 

The chest beneath him was warm and sturdy and safe. He wanted to curl into it and sleep. Wanted the steady breaths to rock him into a deep and silent darkness. Wanted every moment of his life to feel just as gentle and comforting as Akira's touch.

When he finally turned his head again, he realized that his shadow had vanished from the bathroom. Mishima wondered if it was gone for good or if it had just slunk off somewhere again, hidden in the darkness.

A calm voice brought him back from his thoughts, "can you stand?"

"Oh- I. I think so?" Mishima pulled down his sweater in embarrassment and tried to push himself to his feet. The motion was awkward and he had to support himself against the bathroom wall, one hand still half-curled in Akira's shirt. The taller boy waited for him patiently and let him lean against his body once he was up so that they didn't fall over.

Mishima bit his lip, "are the others waiting?" 

"No, I told them to go back home." 

"What- But it could have been dangerous." 

Akira half smiled, "I told you, your shadow isn't violent. At least not towards me. I realized that when we met him earlier." 

They both settled into an easy silence as Mishima tried to understand the words and what exactly they meant. He was _glad_ that his shadow hadn't tried to hurt the Phantom Thieves. He didn't know what he'd have done if they'd gotten hurt because of him. He shivered and Akira pulled him closer as they left the bar and stepped out into the alleyway. 

Their breath fogged in the air and Mishima felt the stiff tug of sleep at his brain again. 

"My place is closer. Want to stay over?" The question was casual but Mishima was pretty sure he'd never heard a more beautiful sequence of words. 

"Yes." Not the most eloquent response. At least it got the job done. The other boy nodded and they slowly made their way through the dimly lit city streets. The tall lamp lights cast bright circles on the wet pavement and somehow the stillness, the emptiness, was beautiful. 

For the first time in months, Mishima thought maybe he felt happy. At peace. 

He knew that he was still broken—still had large cracks inside that needed to be filled and sealed—but for once the task seemed somewhat plausible. Akira couldn't save him from himself every time, but maybe once was enough. 

The moon was large and watchful above them. 

A cafe bell jingled as they stepped into the warmth and out of the night. 

  
It felt a little like coming home. 

  


**Author's Note:**

> I love Mishima's character and like...just...so much happened to him and I think that he deserves someone to like fret over him and help him because gosh.


End file.
